Proper dental cleanings require full anesthesia. You may find groomers or other facilities that advertise "anesthesia-free cleanings," but these procedures are neither safe nor truly effective. It's nearly impossible to thoroughly scale all of your pet's teeth if they are awake! Let's not even talk about how unkind it would be to EXTRACT teeth on a pet that was not under anesthesia!!!

Because true dental cleanings require full anesthesia, we require pre-anesthetic blood work prior to administering anesthesia. We do this to check your pet's liver and kidney function, and to make sure they are a good candidate for anesthesia. After all, administering anesthesia to a pet in liver or kidney failure could have dire consequences. This bloodwork can be done up to 30 days in advance of the dental cleaning, or on the morning of. Either way, the results will be reviewed by a veterinarian before we move ahead with the procedure.

After the vet has reviewed the bloodwork results, the next step is to place an IV catheter, so that your pet can receive IV fluids throughout the procedure. Once the catheter is set, we move forward with anesthesia. Your pet is intubated and placed on an inhalant anesthetic for the duration of the dental.

The dental begins with a technician getting full-mouth radiographs, so the vet can assess the condition of the teeth below the gums - this often helps us identify hidden issues, like rotten roots and more. After obtaining the radiographs, and while the vet reviews them, the tech then begins the cleaning process by gently scaling the surface of the teeth with an ultrasonic scaler. This is how we safely remove tartar and plaque from the surface of the tooth and beneath the gumline. Once scaling is complete, the vet steps in to assess the condition of the now-plaque-free teeth - checking for gum recession, exposed roots, bifurcations, fractures, and more. The vet then begins the extraction process. Once extractions are complete, we get another x-ray of the mouth, to make sure we've gotten all of the bits and pieces necessary for a full recovery. After reviewing the post-extraction x-rays, the vet then gives the technician the go ahead to polish any remaining teeth. Once the polishing is complete, the anesthesia ends and your pets is gently woken up in a cozy kennel, where they can recover peacefully.

We're often asked if the vet will call you before going ahead with necessary extractions, and the answer is no. We would lose valuable time if we stopped every procedure to place a phone call that may or may not be answered, and that could increase the risk of anesthetic-related complications. In addition, we need you to trust us. We only extract teeth that absolutely need to be extracted. Extractions are difficult and take a long time to complete , and we've never met a veterinarian that actually enjoyed pulling teeth. So, please trust that we only pull teeth that absolutely need to be pulled.

If you want to save as many teeth as possible, we hope you'll seriously consider taking your pet directly to a dental specialist. That's literally why dental specialists exist! https://www.azvetdentists.com/